


Moving On

by gorseflower



Category: Ballet Shoes - Noel Streatfeild
Genre: Gen, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-23
Updated: 2016-06-23
Packaged: 2018-07-16 22:01:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,395
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7286296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gorseflower/pseuds/gorseflower
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sylvia and Pauline spend some time with Petrova, before they're separated by an ocean.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Moving On

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Deepdarkwaters](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deepdarkwaters/gifts).



"Two excellent productions, I remember them well," said the headmistress. She had spent most of the interview talking to Dr Smith and Sylvia, but now she looked across her heavy oak desk with interest at Petrova herself. "You must have learned a great deal from Donald Houghton, Petrova."

Petrova felt rather self-conscious. "We weren't allowed to speak to him much," she said. She had not really been listening to Dr Smith's account of her educational history, because her head was still full of the laboratories and library she had seen on their tour of the school, and the beautifully-maintained grounds from which you could see the planes flying in and out of Croydon Airport. The headmistress was still looking at her, so she added "I was in a dance-troupe, too, last Christmas. In 'Jack and the Beanstalk'."

"Yes, well," said the headmistress with a slight frown. "I suppose it can't always be Shakespeare." She turned back to Sylvia and continued:

"I'm afraid we only have dancing once a week, but there is a school play every term and I'm sure Miss Martin will be delighted to have a new pupil with such talent. I believe Petrova will be the first Croydon High School girl to have appeared on stage professionally."

Despite her admiration for Donald Houghton there was hint of disapproval in the headmistress's voice at the word 'professionally'. Sylvia had to bite back the desire to defend herself, but Petrova didn't notice it. She was suppressing a look of alarm. She'd seen the hall with its stage as well, but it had been so long since she'd been at a normal school that she'd forgotten about school plays.

"Would I be in the play every term?" she asked in a carefully neutral voice.

"You would have to take your turn with the smaller parts, but I don't see why not," said the headmistress. "The main roles usually go to the older girls, but Miss Martin may make an exception in your case."

"I don't want exceptions," said Petrova hastily. "I mean, I'd prefer to be treated like everyone else."

The headmistress smiled at this and said, "Quite right, of course." She turned to Sylvia and added, "We do have a rule that only the girls who take elocution classes appear in the plays. They take place after school on Thursdays and cost an extra £10 per term."

"That won't be a problem," said Sylvia, feeling relieved yet again at the disappearance of all her financial worries. She could ask Gum to pay for it, since Pauline was already spending so much on Posy.

Petrova for a moment wished the money worries were back and she had an easier excuse.

"Actually," she said, "I wouldn't mind not acting for a bit."

Sylvia met Petrova's earnest gaze. She didn't want Petrova to miss out on acting for the sake of £30 a year, but Petrova must know that didn't matter any more. The headmistress's study with its wood-panelled walls and oil paintings of women in academic dress secretly intimidated her, and she glanced over at Dr Smith to see her reaction.

"That might not be a bad idea," said Dr Smith. "You'll have enough to get used to in a new school as it is."

"Of course, there's no need to decide quite yet," said the headmistress. She and Dr Smith began to discuss matriculation subjects. Petrova, relieved, went back to thinking about the library.

\--

"Are you sure you don't want to go to the elocution classes? We can spare the money, and you might settle in better if you can do something you're used to." Sylvia said later. Dr Smith had gone to say goodbye to her friend who taught in the Mathematics department before they walked back to Gum's new house for tea, and Sylvia and Petrova were waiting for her in the grounds.

"I'll be busy with schoolwork and flying. And I have done an awful lot of acting already."

It was so hard to know what Petrova really wanted, thought Sylvia. She wasn't like the other two. Petrova had certainly not shown any hesitation when the doctors suggested this school, and warned her that she wouldn't have time to carry on at the Academy as well.

"If you change your mind, just tell us and we'll arrange it," she said.

Petrova found herself feeling rather guilty. When they'd needed the money, there'd been no question of telling Sylvia how much she disliked acting. What she'd never really thought about was what she'd tell her when she was able to stop. She was beginning to see her temporary white lie stretching out for all the rest of their lives.

"I think," she said, rather cautiously, "I really only liked it because Pauline and Posy were doing it too. I don't particularly want to do it on my own."

She thought of flying with Pauline in 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', and Posy's imitations at the Academy, and the three of them doing exercises on the beach in Sussex, and decided it was true enough for now. 

Sylvia took her hand and held it tightly, and Petrova pressed back a little harder than a fourteen-year-old future explorer should really need to.

"And you think you'll like it here?" Sylvia indicated the grounds and the imposing Victorian buildings with her other hand.

"Oh, yes." Petrova smiled in a way Sylvia had never seen her do at the thought of a dancing-class or play.

They watched as classes finished and girls began to emerge from the buildings. They all wore identical tunics, and they split off into pairs and groups as they scattered across the lawn. Petrova suddenly wished quite desperately that Pauline was coming with her. It was funny to think she'd be the only Fossil in the school -- in fact, the only Fossil in the country. Everyone knew the three of them at the Academy, and would call "Hello, Fossils!" when they saw them in the refectory or arriving for classes.

"Will they think I'm odd?" she asked Sylvia.

"Because you like cars?"

"No -- what Miss Lannister said -- that they haven't been on stage, or to auditions. Their sisters won't be film stars or live in Czechoslovakia. They'll have..." She stopped before saying they'd have mothers and fathers, because she didn't want Sylvia to think she'd rather have a mother and father than a guardian. "They won't have ichthyosaurs in their sitting rooms."

Sylvia looked away so Petrova wouldn't see her smile. "I'll ask Gum to put the ichthyosaur upstairs, though I can't guarantee it'll stay there. As for the other things... they might find them interesting at first, but after a while they'll get used to it and you'll just be Petrova. But if you're really unhappy, promise me you'll tell the doctors or Theo or Mr and Mrs Simpson or Winifred's mother." Listing all the people who'd promised to keep an eye on Petrova made Sylvia feel a little better about leaving her on a different continent, but only a little. She'd already had to say goodbye to Posy, and she'd cried all night afterwards.

"I promise. And I'll have Gum."

Sylvia did not have quite as much faith in Gum as Petrova did, but she was glad at how well the two got on.

"Perhaps I should talk to Mr Reubens again, I'm sure we could postpone Pauline's contract until your first week of term is over."

"Garnie, don't be silly, you've bought all the tickets. I'll be fine."

They saw Dr Smith come out of the building and wave to them, and set off to join her. An aeroplane flew low overhead and Petrova looked up to identify it.

"That's a Hornet Moth," she said. She turned her head to watch it fly away, and noticed that two of the girls on the lawn were watching it too.

"Had a good look around?" asked Dr Smith when they reached her. Petrova nodded. She was still holding Sylvia's hand.

"I've had a word with Lucy -- she'll be Miss Wynne to you, Petrova. She says she'll ask for you to be in her house when you start here, and she'll be teaching you mathematics if they do put you in with the older girls."

"Thank you," said Sylvia.

\--

After tea Dr Smith and Dr Jakes left to go back to Bloomsbury, and Pauline and Sylvia vanished into Gum's study. Petrova suspected they were discussing her school fees; Pauline was treated almost as a grown-up about money now and she and Sylvia spent a lot of time discussing it. Petrova began heading up to her room, where she had a new handbook which Mr Simpson had lent her, but then she heard Gum calling her name from the back door.

"Petrova! Come and help with the plants!"

Petrova decided her new handbook could wait and ran back downstairs to join Gum in his greenhouse. He and his companions had collected seeds all over the South Seas and brought them back to London in special cases. The rare ones had gone to Kew Gardens, but Gum, who was not such an expert on rare plants as rare fossils, had liked many of the common ones just as much and had ordered several types of special soil so that he could grow them at home. Petrova had already become good at looking them up in the meticulous records he had kept and helping to decipher what conditions they needed to grow. 

This time he'd already found the page in his notebook and was perusing it carefully. When Petrova appeared alongside him, he looked up and handed her a little peppermint-tin full of seeds.

"Acacia silvestris. Brought it back for Sylvia," he said. Petrova tilted the tin and watched the little seeds slide over each other.

"It's rather a dull present at the moment," Gum admitted. "The cuttings I collected all died. But if we plant these, it'll look nice by the time she gets back from California."

Petrova nodded and took the notebook. "Dry soil," she said. "I don't think it'll need a heat lamp."

Gum fetched a bag of soil from under a bench and began tipping it into a flowerpot.

"About time Sylvia had a turn at going somewhere interesting," he said. "Have I told you about my time in California? It was just before the war... more than ten years ago now? Fifteen perhaps?"

"Twenty-two?" suggested Petrova.

"Goodness, it was. Twenty-five, in fact. The tar pits there preserved everything which fell into them. Canis dirus, smilodon fatalis, arctodus, antilocapra. Marvellous fossils!" His expression reminded Petrova of Posy when she came back from the ballet at Covent Garden and tried to show them the steps she'd seen. "I'd only been back from Kenya six months, but when I heard about it I took leave from the university at once and went over there..."

Petrova carefully planted the seeds while she listened to Gum telling his story. He seemed to have been to all the interesting places she'd read about, and he loved to talk about them, although she sometimes had to redirect the conversation when he started talking about fossils for too long. He was telling her about his visit to the oil fields when Pauline appeared.

"Could I speak to Petrova outside?" she asked.

"Of course," said Gum. Petrova followed Pauline out into the garden. It was raining outside, and they went into the shed. Pauline sat down on one of the wooden crates full of fossils which didn't fit into the new house.

"It's about the vow," she said. Petrova looked at her, surprised. It didn't seem quite right to discuss the vow without Posy there.

"I'm going to put aside some of my salary for you - not as much as I'm sending to Posy, but it'll come to at least two thousand pounds after five years. Enough to pay for an aeroplane, or flying lessons -- whatever you need."

"Thanks." Petrova felt rather embarrassed. She leaned against the workbench and fiddled with the handle of the vice.

"We vowed to do whatever we can, and I won't be able to do much if I'm a stage actress later," said Pauline, "so I'm going to do my best now. Garnie thinks it's a good idea too. I didn't tell her about the vow, of course."

"No." Petrova wished that Posy was there more than ever. "I think it's horrible that they made you sign that contract," she said. "They can't force you to stay there if you hate it, can they?"

"They can make it very difficult. It's how the film industry works - they need to invest in their stars. It's not like theatre. I can't let them know I want to leave after five years, either, or they won't let me have better parts."

Petrova sighed. "I know you've decided to do it. I just wish it wasn't so far away."

"You'll come to visit next summer," Pauline reminded her. "There'll be beaches, and there are theatres there. Oh, and Mr Reubens says we'll need our own car."

"An American car?" Petrova lit up with excitement. "Could you get a Chrysler?"

"I expect so. If I send you the advertising brochures, will you write and tell us which one to choose?"

Petrova nodded seriously. "Mr Simpson had a Chrysler in the garage last month, but it'd gone by Sunday. I'll ask him more about it. Perhaps you can bring it back when your five years are up."

"Maybe."

"I suppose," said Petrova thoughtfully, "if you keep being an actress until you're seventy, you'll have forty-nine years of being on stage, and only five in films. Not counting the last four."

"That's true." Pauline looked more cheerful. 

Petrova looked outside, but it was still raining.They remained in silence for a moment, and then Gum put his head around the door.

"Ah, Petrova," he said, "I tried to turn up one of the heat lamps and now they've all gone out."

Petrova frowned. "Probably the fuse. I'll have to turn off the generator."

She opened a drawer and began to search through it for the right screwdriver. Gum and Pauline followed her back to the greenhouse and watched as she examined the generator. Gum caught Pauline's eye.

"All this modern machinery..." he said with a sigh.

Pauline smiled. "It'll be alright," she said.

**Author's Note:**

> History: there is an actual Croydon High School for Girls which existed at the time, but I don't know much actual detail about it. There are some cool pictures of the La Brea tar pit excavations in California here : https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=lpcLAT2Yb2EC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false (page 19 onwards)


End file.
